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Laura Van Prooyen-Headshot-Closed Smile.jpg

Sorry, We No Longer Offer Bereavement Fares by Laura Van Prooyen (Chapbook)

$12.00

Sorry, We No Longer Offer Bereavement Fares records the intensity and absurdity of enduring grief after the death of a brother. As darkly humorous as they are deeply felt, these poems aim their anger at Southwest Airlines, their suffering toward Pema Chödrön and Mary Oliver, and scorn in the direction of Randall Jarell and a problematic cat. Grief is unpredictable and wild, creating an urge to retreat from and lash out at a world that insists on going on; yet the fever-pitch cannot last forever. In this concise collection, Van Prooyen’s poems navigate ferocity and futility brought on by deep sorrow but turn and return to memory as a balm; the sting of loss simmers down, and the ache of missing reverberates like the greatest scream in the history of Rock & Roll.

Sorry, We No Longer Offer Bereavement Fares records the intensity and absurdity of enduring grief after the death of a brother. As darkly humorous as they are deeply felt, these poems aim their anger at Southwest Airlines, their suffering toward Pema Chödrön and Mary Oliver, and scorn in the direction of Randall Jarell and a problematic cat. Grief is unpredictable and wild, creating an urge to retreat from and lash out at a world that insists on going on; yet the fever-pitch cannot last forever. In this concise collection, Van Prooyen’s poems navigate ferocity and futility brought on by deep sorrow but turn and return to memory as a balm; the sting of loss simmers down, and the ache of missing reverberates like the greatest scream in the history of Rock & Roll.

Laura Van Prooyen is author of three books of poems, most recently, Frances of the Wider Field (Lily Poetry Review Books), a Finalist for both the Texas Institute of Letters Helen C. Smith Memorial Award and the Writers’ League of Texas Book Awards. She is also author of Our House Was on Fire, nominated by Philip Levine, awarded the McGovern Prize (Ashland Poetry Press) and Inkblot and Altar (Pecan Grove Press). Van Prooyen earned an M.F.A. in Poetry at Warren Wilson College, teaches at Trinity University, and works with Mission Belonging facilitating free online writing workshops for healthcare providers. She is the Founder and Director of Next Page Press.

With punch and pith, Sorry, We No Longer Offer Bereavement Fares calls out hope as the “hoax” it can be yet offers relief by truly acknowledging irresolvable losses. Such poetry wouldn’t presume to tell us how to carry on after a loved one’s death, but exhilarating cadences—unflinchingly realistic and distilled, conversational, lush, and lyrical—propel the pages forward. Van Prooyen’s poems— and a pansy, a peppermint, the smallest shining things as she presents them—make me glad to be in this world.  

—Rose McLarney, author of Colorfast, Forage, and Its Day Being Gone

Sorry, We No Longer Offer Bereavement Fares is a collection of striking poems built from a powerful grief. Laura Van Prooyen writes “See? / I’m scooping a little sunshine into each dark hole,” but this isn’t a poet aiming for easy comfort. She dives directly into the abyss of personal loss, and the poems that emerge from that dark hole are full of rage and sorrow and ready to wrestle God. 
—Matthew Olzmann, author of Constellation Route, Contradictions in Design, and Mezzanines